ash
by Self-Inflicted Insanity
Summary: (Sequel to "ink".) Light and Lawliet are dead, and bored. There's really not much to do when you're dead, after all, aside from wander aimlessly and take turns stating the obvious.
1. chapter i: deadlock

**an:** Sequel to _ink_ , but you don't necessarily have to have read that story to read this one, since nothing really happens in that story. All you need to know is that, due to certain AU circumstances that do not make any canonical sense, Light did not die after getting shot by Matsuda, and instead he gave up his memories of the Death Note and being Kira so that Near and the others couldn't win, and was then locked away in solitary confinement where he went crazy, and then eventually died.

And now he's dead (and he regained his memories in the process). L is dead, also, and they somehow ended up in the same place. Thus ensues this story.

And I know that the manga creators said that in the Death Note verse everyone goes to Mu (nothingness) after they died, but these are just fanfics I'm writing for fun, so I can do whatever I want. And I just felt like writing this.

I hope that at least one person out there gets some enjoyment out of it, though. *cue L's cute face*

* * *

 **deadlock**

Lawliet, when Light found him, was crouched on the edge of nothingness and holding a piece of cake.

Light's footsteps made no noise and he was not breathing, but Lawliet sensed him anyway.

'I hated seeing you that way, Kira.'

Light sat down next to him. 'I know.'

Lawliet looked at him sideways, eyes like shadowed prison walls. 'Did you do that just to anger me?'

The sky, when Light looked at it, was heavy with gray mist, and starless. 'Like you said, L: Kira is childish, and hates to lose.'

'You hate to lose so badly that you would rather demean and destroy yourself than admit defeat.' It wasn't a question.

Light looked at him. 'You did the same thing, you know.'

The fork paused in the air. 'I did not know that you saw it that way.' The fork moved again, carving off a piece of the cake.

'Yes, you did,' said Light.

'Yes, I did,' agreed Lawliet, and held the fork with the bite of cake out towards him. 'Do you want some cake, Kira?'

'No.'

'Are you sure?'

'Yes.'

Lawliet turned his dark gaze away, and the fork retreated. 'More for me, then.'

Light looked out over the nothingness before them, and Lawliet ate his cake.

'I'm not sorry,' said Light, after a long time.

'Neither am I, Kira.' The second to last bite of cake was balancing on the fork. 'Last chance for cake, by the way.'

Light glanced at him. 'We're dead, L.'

'I know that, Kira.' The piece of cake was eaten.

'Yeah, I know,' said Light, almost petulant. 'But the least you could do is act like it.'

'I do not plan on giving Kira that satisfaction,' said Lawliet, almost vindictive.

'Yeah,' said Light, and sighed without breath. 'I figured it was too much to hope for.'

Lawliet scooped up the last piece of cake, staring at it. 'Well, Kira always _was_ delusional.'

Light gestured to the fork. 'What does it taste like? The cake?'

'Regret,' answered Lawliet, meeting his gaze without expression. 'Want to try some?'

'No.'

'Suit yourself,' said Lawliet, looking away, but the piece of cake did not disappear into his mouth.

Light was watching him. 'I'm curious, though, what it is that the great _L_ regrets.'

The piece of cake was carefully laid back down on the plate. 'I'd be entertained to hear you guess.'

The sky was just as gray and starless as the last time Light had looked at it, and all the times before that, as well.

'You regret not finishing that last piece of cake, don't you,' said Light, after a while.

Lawliet was almost smiling. 'Kira knows me quite well.'

Light shrugged. ' _Know thy enemy_ , as they say.'

'Yes,' agreed Lawliet, watching him. 'And Kira does not regret anything.'

Light almost smiled. 'No,' he agreed, 'I suppose at this point I don't.'


	2. chapter ii: acceptance

**acceptance**

Lawliet was arranging pebbles in the ash.

Light was watching him. 'Are we friends now, L?'

Lawliet carefully set another pebble. 'We were always friends, Kira.'

Light stared hard at the side of Lawliet's face. 'I hated you.'

Lawliet didn't look at him. 'I know.'

'And yet you still considered someone who hated you a friend,' said Light, watching the pebbles line up beneath cagey fingers.

A pebble paused in the air. 'I never hated you.' The pebble lowered, the ash cratering around it.

'Not even when I beat you?' asked Light.

Lawliet's eyes, when they met his, were too dark for anything to be seen within them. 'I always thought I'd die alone, you know.' The inkwells turned away, and another pebble joined the line. 'It was nice not to.'

'You died in the arms of your enemy,"' said Light.

'There are worse ways to die,' said Lawliet, placing another pebble in the ash. 'Like alone in a cell, abandoned even by your own sanity.'

'But I won,' said Light.

'No,' said Lawliet, pausing with a pebble between thumb and forefinger. 'You made sure that everybody lost.' The pebble stacked on top of another.

'It's the same thing,' said Light.

Another pebble was placed. 'No, it's not.'

Light tilted his head, watching the pebbles stack up, slowly building a wall.

'I hurt you, didn't I.' It wasn't a question.

The next pebble took a beat too long to find its place. 'The dead can't feel pain, Kira.'

'They can't eat cake, either,' said Light.

A pebble was misplaced, scattering the ash into which it fell. Light waited.

Lawliet stared at the gray residue smudged on his fingers. 'It's nice to know that solitary confinement did not damage Kira's psyche permanently.'

Pale fingers rubbed together, but the gray stayed, embedded in the lines of his fingerprints.

'You thought you'd be alone,' realized Light. 'Even when I died.'

The ash drifted slowly towards the ground, stirred only by a gentle, unnecessary exhalation. 'Kira was my first-ever—and only—friend.'

Light closed his eyes, and seemed to find something in the darkness there. 'L was my only friend, also.'

'Yes,' came Lawliet's voice, lowly. 'I know.'

The ash settled over them softly, and neither of them moved to brush it off.


	3. chapter iii: boredom

**boredom**

Light was lying on his back, arms behind his head, and Lawliet was lying next to him, the both of them staring up at nothingness.

'Let's go somewhere,' said Light, after an eternity.

'Where do you suppose to go, Kira?' asked Lawliet.

'Somewhere,' answered Light. 'Anywhere. Not here.'

'You could go alone, you know,' pointed out Lawliet.

'I know,' said Light.

'There's nowhere to go,' said Lawliet, after another eternity.

'There's always somewhere to go,' said Light.

'Then why have you been lying here?' said Lawliet.

'You tell me, L,' said Light, standing up and offering a hand. 'Are you coming or not?'

Lawliet looked up at him, and Light held his gaze.

Eventually, Lawliet took his hand, and Light pulled him to his feet.

Lawliet wiped his hand on his pants.

'I could punch you, you know,' said Light.

'You could,' agreed Lawliet. 'There would be no point to doing so, though.'

'I know,' said Light, and started walking. 'Come on.'

Lawliet fell into step beside him.


	4. chapter iv: despair

**despair**

'It must be difficult,' said Lawliet, after an eternity of walking, 'to reconcile your memories.' Light looked at him, and two black voids stared back. 'You must hate yourself.'

'What makes you say that?' asked Light, turning his gaze back to the pathless, mist-shrouded ground ahead of them.

'When you didn't remember being Kira, you must have hated Kira for getting you into those situations; but as Kira, you must have hated your ignorant self for being a fool,' said Lawliet, slouching along next to him, dragging bare feet in the ash. 'And now you have to reconcile both those sentiments.'

'If that's the case, L,' said Light, fingers curling and relaxing in the pockets of black pants, 'then you must hate yourself, as well.'

Lawliet tilted his head. 'And from what do you draw that conclusion, Kira?'

'Everything is clearer in hindsight,' said Light, looking up at the gray mist that obscured the view of whatever was above them. 'You must look back at the case and realize that you could have figured it out sooner, and that if you had, less people would be dead.'

'I could not have done anything else, Kira,' said Lawliet, his voice too soft.

Light glanced at him out of the corner of his eye. 'You let your emotions get in the way.'

The black voids bored into him. 'I was not the only one.'

'No, you're right,' conceded Light, looking down so that his hair obscured his eyes, a small smile just barely visible on his lips. 'But you considered Light your friend, and Kira your enemy. That can't be an easy thing to reconcile.'

'I always knew you were Kira,' said Lawliet.

'At one point, you doubted.'

'No, I never doubted,' said Lawliet, a thumb just barely touching his lips. 'I only ever lacked evidence, and became frustrated.'

Light looked up again, and when the hair fell away from his face, his eyes were carefully blank. 'Do you want to know why I can reconcile my memories, L?'

'Do enlighten me.'

'We've been talking about Kira and Light like they're two different people,' said Light, 'but they're not. They never were. Kira and Light are the same person, just in different circumstances.' Fingers rested, spider-like, at the black button holding together the left cuff of his shirt. 'If you stopped trying to keep Ryuzaki, L, and Lawliet as separate identities, you might hate yourself less.'

'Kira has made two incorrect assumptions,' remarked Lawliet, and watched the fingers skitter away and return to the dark pockets from whence they'd come. 'One: I never said that I hated myself. And two: it was never _I_ who thought of them as separate identities.'

Light looked at him, and smiled. 'We're both pathological liars, L.'

'Not much point in lying when we're dead,' pointed out Lawliet.

'There's not much point in telling the truth, either,' pointed out Light. 'Besides, nothing about the word 'pathologic' suggests that there's a sane reason.'

'Sanity is relative,' said Lawliet.

Light's lips remained curved upwards. 'So is justice.'

'Yes,' agreed Lawliet, 'but I had the law on my side.'

'The law is a failure,' said Light.

'But it's better than having no law,' pointed out Lawliet.

Light grinned, wry. 'This conversation is going nowhere.'

'Neither are we, Kira,' pointed out Lawliet.

Light laughed, mirthless, and the sound seemed to continue even after he'd gone silent.


	5. chapter v: disappointment

**disappointment**

Light was kneeling down in the ash, one sleeve rolled up, holding a sharp rock in one hand and digging it into his arm.

'What is Kira doing?' asked Lawliet, watching.

'Trying to tear open my arm with a rock,' said Light, digging the jagged edge deeper into his wrist and dragging down.

'I can see that,' said Lawliet, flatly. 'But why is Kira doing it?'

Light shrugged. 'It's not like there's anything else to do.' He tried to peel back the skin, but couldn't. The rock had moved through his arm like butter but had left no wound.

The rock was dropped to the ground, thumping softly into the ash. Light's lips quirked. 'I guess the dead can't bleed, huh?'

'Even if we could,' said Lawliet, 'we can't feel pain.'

'I was wondering,' Light said, and stood, carefully rolling his sleeve back down, over the scars there. 'It seems that all I can feel is boredom.'

A thumb rested against Lawliet's lips. 'Nobody could have found a more effective way to torture us.'

'Yeah.' Light closed his eyes. 'This is worse than the cell. At least there I could believe that there was a world outside. But here,' he opened his eyes, gestured around them, 'there are no walls or ceilings, here. Just endless nothingness in every direction.'

He laughed, and there was no humor in the sound. 'And it's worse; having the freedom to go anywhere, but having absolutely nowhere worth going because it's all the same.'

His lips pulled harshly away from his teeth. 'There's nothing to do here. No diversions.' Another laugh, absent of emotion. 'I can't even hurt myself.'

Lawliet was silent, thumb still against his lips, gaze downcast.

'How do you bear it, L?' asked Light, watching him. 'How have you been bearing it?'

Dark eyes looked up at him. 'I watched you. That was interesting.'

'How did you watch me?' asked Light.

'There was a way,' said Lawliet, 'but it's gone now.' He bent his thumb and forefinger till their tips touched, holding the resulting circle up to one eye and looking through it. 'It was round.'

'That's not helpful,' said Light. He narrowed his eyes. 'But I guess you're still watching me, now. Is it still interesting?'

Lawliet stared back at him through the circle of his fingers. 'It's more interesting than being alone.'

After several moments Light looked away, remaining silent.

Lawliet remained watching.


	6. chapter vi: desolation

**desolation**

Light was looking up through the willow-catkin mist, hands clasped behind his head. 'I feel old.'

'But you still act like a child,' said Lawliet, crouched down and drawing wavering lines in the ash with someone's misplaced rib.

Light tilted his head to look at him. 'Let's become the rulers of this world.'

Lawliet's eyes were wide and dark, and the lips pressed against the side of his thumb tilted slightly upwards. 'It is difficult, sometimes, to tell whether Kira is joking or delusional.'

'You'd be the only one to be able to figure it out, L,' said Light, unclasping his fingers and lowering his arms, spreading them. 'Come on.' He smiled, eyes empty. 'I'll be your mystery, and you can be my adversary.'

Wild black hair was tilted out of serene black eyes. ' _And the dead did not rest_ ,' murmured Lawliet; quietly, thoughtfully, like he was quoting something he'd once read and had not, at the time, understood.

Light's grin was sardonic. 'No rest for the wicked, L.'


	7. chapter vii: nostalgia

**nostalgia**

'I want cake,' said Lawliet, hands in his pockets and shoulders hunched.

Light glanced at him, seemed to hesitate for a moment, looked away. 'I want a shower.'

'Strawberries,' said Lawliet.

'A bath,' said Light.

'Gelato,' said Lawliet.

'A bed,' said Light. 'With pillows.'

'Mochi,' said Lawliet.

'Coffee,' said Light.

'Sugar cubes,' said Lawliet.

'A Death Note,' said Light.

Lawliet looked at him, silent for a moment. 'Is that another attempt at being humorous?'

Light shrugged, itching fingers concealed in his pockets. 'Maybe.'

Lawliet looked away, seemed to hunch further, a thumb coming up to his lips. 'I still want cake.'

Light was looking down at the ash at his feet, hands shoved deeper into his pockets. 'I'm sorry that I can't do anything about that, L.'

Lawliet looked at him from out from under his bangs, the shadows under his eyes pronounced even in death. 'Kira has a poor sense of humor.'

'I was being genuine,' said Light, mildly.

'No,' said Lawliet flatly, 'you weren't.'

Light glanced at him, gaze even. 'Actually, I was.'

'No,' said Lawliet again, holding his gaze, 'you weren't.'

They stared at each other for several moments, unblinking, and then they both looked away and were silent.


	8. chapter viii: languor

**languor**

Lawliet's black hair was frosted with bits of ash, like gray sakura petals.

'You have ash in your hair,' said Light.

Lawliet turned his head to look at him.

'There must be air, here,' continued Light, watching the ash fall gently when Lawliet moved his head, drifting through the air like tiny, downy feathers. 'If there were no air and we were in a vacuum, the ash would not take so long to fall.'

'I don't think physics apply to the afterlife, Kira,' said Lawliet. 'Technically there shouldn't even be an afterlife at all.' He held out a hand, catching particles of ash in his open palm. 'Death, logically, should be the end.'

Light tried to catch the falling ash as well, but the particles escaped when he tried to close his fingers around them. 'Maybe we're in a joint hallucination, then.'

'Maybe,' said Lawliet, holding the ash he'd caught in front of his face to inspect it closer, his absence of breath failing to cast them swirling back up into the air.

'If that's the case,' said Light, watching Lawliet bend his wrist backwards at an awkward angle in order to better examine the particles dusting his palm, 'then there's nothing immoral about me becoming the god of this world.'

Lawliet glanced at him over the heel of his palm, the tips of his awkwardly-curled fingers. 'Kira, as always, has a very interesting perspective on things.'

'You can't tell me that I'm wrong,' said Light.

Reaching out his cupped hand, Lawliet swiveled his wrist and sprinkled the particles of ash over Light's head. 'Now Kira has ash in his hair, as well.'

Light narrowed his eyes and reached up to brush the ash away.

(It was slight, but Lawliet smiled.)


	9. chapter ix: curiosity

**curiosity**

Lawliet was staring up through the gray haze, the ash filtering through like snowflakes or slow-motion rain.

'Hearing bells again?' asked Light.

Lawliet glanced at him out of the corner of his eyes, before returning his gaze to the mist. 'Where does the ash come from?'

'I don't know, L,' said Light.

Lawliet kept staring up at the falling ash. 'Good thing we're detectives, then.'

Light looked at him for a moment, and then laughed.


	10. chapter x: numbness

**numbness**

They were walking, and had been walking for a long time.

'L,' said Light, eventually. 'I want to try something.'

'What is that?' asked Lawliet.

Light stopped walking.

After a few more steps Lawliet stopped, as well, turning around to look at him.

Umber eyes met his, for a moment, and then Light stepped forward and enclosed Lawliet in his arms.

Lawliet was still. 'Why are you hugging me, Kira?'

Light remained there for a moment, head on Lawliet's shoulder, before he stepped back, arms lowering to his sides. His chin was tilted down, bangs obscuring his face. 'I wanted to try something.'

'You didn't have to hug me to see if we have any tangibility,' said Lawliet, raising a thumb to his lips.

'That wasn't what I was testing,' said Light.

'What, then, was Kira testing?' asked Lawliet.

Light looked up, meeting his gaze with empty eyes. 'I wanted to see if it would make me feel better.'

Lawliet tilted his head. 'And?'

Light looked away, hands slipping into his pockets. 'I still don't feel anything.'

'There's nothing strange about that,' said Lawliet. 'We are dead, after all.'

'I feel cheated,' said Light. 'Death was supposed to be the end.'

'This _is_ the end, Kira,' said Lawliet.

'No, it's not,' said Light. 'This is no end; there are no edges. This is the center of infinity.' He looked up, watching the particles of ash drift down towards his face, as if to cover his eyes. 'Death was supposed to be a nothingness; like sleep.'

'Sleep also contains dreams,' pointed out Lawliet.

The particles of ash danced in the air each time Light blinked. 'So you're suggesting this is a dream, then.'

'I'm not suggesting anything,' said Lawliet.

Light closed his eyes, and the ash settled on his eyelashes. 'I'm tired.' He opened his eyes again and sent the ash whirling. 'But the dead don't sleep.'

'I never liked sleep,' said Lawliet, hands tucked in his pockets, gaze lowered. 'It always felt like a waste of time and made me feel depressed.'

'It's not a waste of time if there's nothing to do,' pointed out Light.

Lawliet idly scratched at one ankle with his toes. 'I thought you planned to become the god of this world, Kira.'

Light's hair hid his face. 'I'm working on it.'

'Not very hard, it appears,' said Lawliet.

Light's chin raised slightly, eyes glinting through his bangs. 'I've been thinking.'

'Sounds dangerous,' said Lawliet, glancing at him.

Light shifted his weight for a moment, almost hesitant, and then sat down, arms behind him propping him up and legs stretched out in front of him in the ash. 'You're free to leave, if you're scared.'

Walking over, Lawliet crouched down next to him, staring intently at the side of his face.

Light didn't look at him.

Reaching out a hand, Lawliet started carding his fingers through Light's hair.

Light tilted his head just enough to look at Lawliet out of the corner of one eye. 'What are you doing, L?'

'Playing with your hair,' said Lawliet, and did not pull back his hand or cease the gentle ministrations of his fingers.

Light's expression was unmoved. 'Why?'

'There are no creamer packets to stack,' said Lawliet, lifting a lock of Light's hair and then dropping it back down, letting it fall back into place. 'Unfortunately.'

Light watched him out of the corner of his eye for another moment, and then looked away. 'Do what you want.'

Lawliet's fingers kept carding through his hair.


	11. chapter xi: dissatisfaction

**dissatisfaction**

Light eventually closed his fingers around Lawliet's wrist, stilling the insidious discheveling of his hair.

Lawliet's wrist was cold and completely still, no pulse of blood beneath the skin.

'You have no heartbeat,' remarked Light.

'Well, I _am_ dead, Kira,' pointed out Lawliet, slowly retracting his hand when it was released.

Light tilted his head up, closed his eyes, almost smiled. 'I don't have a heartbeat, either.'

'Need I remind you that you are _also_ dead, Kira,' pointed out Lawliet.

'Well, you constantly feel the need to remind me that I'm Kira,' said Light, opening his eyes, 'so you might as well take it upon yourself to constantly remind me that I'm dead, as well. You never know, after all; I might forget again, and then you'd be alone.'

'I don't think that it is _I_ who is afraid of being alone,' said Lawliet.

Light lowered his gaze to the ash, slightly closer to smiling, but not yet there. 'Solitary confinement may not have completely agreed with me.'

'I think that's putting it lightly,' remarked Lawliet.

Light's lips finally pulled into a grin. 'Well, I _am_ Light, L.'

'Then I suppose I am glad you are here, as well,' said Lawliet, without intonation, 'for otherwise it would be quite dark.'

'Yes,' agreed Light, equally toneless, 'and without L the world would be just a word.'

Dark eyes watched him. 'That is either a terrible pun or very high praise.'

'Don't pin this one on me, L,' said Light. 'You started it.'

'You must be mistaken,' said Lawliet. 'I do believe this was your fault.'

'Or we could just blame Ryuk for setting all of this into motion,' offered Light. 'None of this would have happened if he hadn't dropped the Death Note.'

Lawliet raised a thumb to his lips, dark eyes unblinking. 'Does Kira regret finding the Death Note?'

'No, Kira does not,' said Light, and lay back on the ground, fingers clasped behind his head. 'Please remind Kira to send Ryuk a Thank You card as soon as he finds out where the Shinigami Realm is located.'

'Sounds like an ambitious venture,' remarked Lawliet.

'Of course,' said Light, watching the mist swirl above them in vacillating shades of gray. 'I will become god of that world, as well.'

Lawliet looked down at him. 'Kira is taking that joke too far, I think.'

Umber eyes flicked to meet his. 'And if it's not a joke?'

Lawliet did not blink. 'Then Kira is an idiot.'

Light's lips quirked, and he shifted his gaze back to the fog and the ash that was still inexplicably falling. 'And here I thought L already believed that.'

Lawliet was silent for several moments, hands moving from his knees to his ankles. 'There is a difference between idiocy and mistaken morality.'

'That sounded like a compliment,' remarked Light.

'It wasn't,' said Lawliet, and slowly stood up. 'While I do not believe that Kira is stupid, I do believe that Kira is delusional.'

'There was no delusion,' said Light, still looking upwards, hands behind his head. 'I could have done it.'

'Then why didn't you?' asked Lawliet, looking down at him, hands in his pockets.

Light's eyes flicked to his, then moved away, without urgency. 'I'd be entertained to hear you guess.'

Lawliet watched him, thumb raising to his lips. 'Kira was trying to create a kinder world. But even though there were fewer crimes and no wars, people were not kinder, were they? You wanted them to be happy and grateful, but all they were was scared.'

Light's eyes flicked back to his, devoid of emotion.

'Kira probably also got bored, and lost his edge,' noted Lawliet, and his eyes were dark abysses. 'How much of your motivation was to change the world, and how much was just to beat me?'

Eyes still blank, Light smiled at him. 'Foolish L. It was both.' His gaze slid away again, and so did the smile. The gray mist reflected on the surface of his eyes. 'Was it nature, or was it nurture? The answer is always both, and you cannot separate one from the other. There are no percentages.'

'How did it feel,' said Lawliet, quietly. 'To beat me.'

When Light looked over at him, Lawliet was looking down, and did not meet his eyes. His hands were in his pockets, thumb no longer at his lips. His back was slouched, shoulders hunched, wild dark hair obscuring his face.

'It felt great,' said Light, and stretched, before relaxing back against the ground. 'Up until it didn't.'

Lawliet did not look at him.

'How did it feel,' said Light, gazing upwards. 'To watch me lose my mind.'

'It felt terrible,' came Lawliet's voice, after a pause. 'Up until it didn't.'

'Then I guess we're even,' said Light, and stood, brushing the light gray ash from his dark clothes.

'Yes,' said Lawliet, fingers twisting slightly in his white shirt, stained dark gray with ash, 'I suppose you could say that.'


	12. chapter xii: morality

**morality**

'Do you think I'm evil, L?' asked Light, as they were walking.

Lawliet looked over at him. 'I do not think that Kira's intentions were evil.' He tilted his chin down, but not his gaze, shadows both within and beneath his eyes. 'His actions, however, were certainly evil.'

Light's lips quirked. 'The wrong thing for the right reasons, huh?' His hair fell over his eyes, lips pulling further apart. 'I really thought I could make the world a better place, you know.'

Lawliet stared at him, then looked away, shoulders hunched. 'I know.'

'You must be proud of him,' said Light, and tilted his head to watch Lawliet out of the corner of his eye. 'Near.'

Lawliet's hands were in his pockets, and they stayed there. 'Near did well, but Kira also did poorly.'

Light laughed. 'Don't tell me you're disappointed in me, L.'

Lawliet was silent, and Light's eyes glinted.

'No,' realized Light, and grinned. 'You resent that Near succeeded in doing what you couldn't.'

Lawliet tilted his head back, looking at him. 'Near would not have been able to defeat you if not for Mello. Neither could have beaten you alone.' A pause, and Lawliet looked away, thumb coming up to rest against his lips. 'Also, it took them five years and 70 days. I was almost there after 342 days. That's a 554.09% faster success rate.'

Light laughed so hard he doubled over, and Lawliet waited, watching.


	13. chapter xiii: kindness

**kindness**

'Thank you, Kira,' said Lawliet, when Light's laughter came to an end.

Light glanced at him, eyes glittering and empty. 'For what, L?'

The corners of Lawliet's lips curved upwards, but the soul-crushing darkness of his eyes did not lessen. 'For smiling when you killed me.' His eyes and his smile both widened. 'I appreciate that you let me know I was right.'

'I wanted you to die knowing that I beat you,' said Light.

Lawliet still looked delighted by something. 'It was kind of you.'

'Kindness was not my intention,' said Light, without expression except for the narrowing of his eyes.

'There's nothing more unkind than a mystery left unsolved,' said Lawliet, the thumb pressed to his lips obscuring whether or not he was still smiling.

The skin around Light's eyes relaxed slightly. 'You just hate being wrong.'

'And Kira hates to lose,' said Lawliet.

Light's lips quirked, his bangs brushing over his cheekbones, hiding his eyes. 'And we both destroyed ourselves because of that.'

'Do you think that's where the ash comes from?' asked Lawliet, watching the flecks of gray filter through the mist and settle over the ground.

Light laughed, throwing back his head. 'That's torturing you, isn't it?'

Lawliet's eyes were wiped-blank chalkboards. 'Is Kira not also curious?'

'I don't care about the ash,' said Light, hands in his pockets, kicking at the ground and sending the flakes of gray swirling.

'Kira doesn't care about anything,' said Lawliet.

Light tilted his head back, glancing at him. 'Is that really what you think?'

'If it's not the case,' said Lawliet, unblinking, 'then prove me wrong.'

Light's lips quirked. 'Is that a challenge, L?'

'Does Kira want it to be?' said Lawliet.

'I don't think,' said Light, eventually, looking upwards at the ash drifting down from somewhere far above them that they could not see, 'that it really matters.'

'I was right, then,' said Lawliet, biting at his thumb. 'Kira truly does not care about anything.'

'Did all the murders I committed seem like the actions of someone who didn't care about anything?' asked Light.

'You certainly didn't care about their lives, or the ramifications of your actions,' said Lawliet. Light looked over at him, and Lawliet leaned towards him, adding, 'I think you were just bored.'

'What do you think I'm going to do now, then?' said Light, without emotion.

Lawliet was looking delighted again. 'I'm just waiting for Kira to snap.'

'Yeah,' said Light, and looked away, glancing at the grime beneath his fingernails. 'Me, too.'


	14. chapter xiv: manipulation

**manipulation**

There were huge ribs looming out of the ground, as if some massive and extinct creature had laid down and died there.

Light was running a hand over the surface, and the ivory was worn so smooth that he could glimpse his reflection on the surface, even in the dim lighting.

Staring at his reflection, Light let his lips curve upwards. 'I forgive you, L.'

Lawliet was crouched down, a human skull held carefully in his hands. 'I do not think I will ever forgive Kira.'

'That's okay,' said Light, letting his hand slip down the ivory surface. 'I forgive you for that, too.'

Lawliet looked up from the skull's empty eyesockets. 'Kira is lying.'

Light let out a laugh, finally turning to look at him. 'That's awfully ironic, coming from you, L.' His expression resembled that of the vacant, grinning skull. 'Have you ever told the truth at any point since you were born?'

Lawliet carefully set the skull down in the ash. 'Of course I have, Kira.'

'You're right,' said Light, turning away again. 'That was a stupid question. Some of the best lies are, after all, carefully-phrased truths.' He met Lawliet's dark gaze in the reflection of the smooth bone. 'How about this, then: have you ever, in your entire life, said anything without the intention being to manipulate?'

Lawliet stood, wiping his hands carefully on his jeans. 'What other reason is there to say anything, Kira?'

Light laughed. 'Fair enough.' He glanced at Lawliet out of the corner of his eyes, lips pulled apart to reveal a glimpse of ivory teeth. 'I guess it says a lot about the both of us that we're still talking, then.'

Lawliet smiled slightly, hands slipping into his pockets, and did not say anything.


	15. chapter xv: sympathy

**sympathy**

They stood gazing out over a field of bones. It stretched as far as they could see into the mists, bones polished white with time and seeming to glow faintly in the halflight.

Lawliet's hands were tucked in his pockets. 'What was your childhood like, Kira?'

Tendrils of mist curled over the dissembled skeletons. 'Boring,' said Light, after a while. He didn't look at him. 'You?'

A bone somewhere in the pile slipped, and there was a muted clattering as it caused a small boneslide, shifting a portion of the field.

'Painful,' said Lawliet, after a while.

Light's eyes traced over the new patterns. 'When did you start solving cases?'

'When my parents died.' There was another soft clattering of bones, and Lawliet's eyes flicked towards the sound. 'But I didn't become L until later.'

'Who were you before you were L?' asked Light, tone as weightless as the mists.

'Nobody.' The skeletons reflected on the surfaces of Lawliet's eyes. 'Who were you before you were Kira?'

Light's gaze flicked over the skulls and their empty grins. 'The person everyone else thought they wanted to be.'

'No wonder you became Kira,' said Lawliet, watching the ash settling gently over the fleshless corpses, slowly burying them. 'I pity you.'

'And why is that?' asked Light, tone like ash slipping over smooth ivory.

'I could have become like you, you know,' said Lawliet, and there was the dampened rumble of bones tumbling over each other in he distance, somewhere obscured to them by the mists. 'If my intellect hadn't been given another outlet.'

Light's gaze landed on a skull that did not look human. 'You're saying?'

'Kira should be able to deduce what I'm saying.' said Lawliet, finally turning his head to look at him.

Light was still staring out over the unburied mass grave. 'Maybe I'm bored and have nothing better to do than try to get you to just say it.'

'Very well, then,' said Lawliet. 'If you insist.' His dark gaze shifted upwards, watching the falling ash, before flicking back to Light's face. 'You didn't actually care about changing the world, did you, Kira.' The words were ordered into a question but Lawliet's tone did not lift inquiringly at the end, staying low; even. 'You just needed something challenging to apply yourself to.'

Light nudged a femur with his foot, and the bones around it clattered as they rearranged themselves. 'I don't see what difference it makes.'

'It's why you lost,' said Lawliet. 'If you'd actually wanted to change the world, you would have done things differently.'

Light glanced at him, eyes gray in the gloom. 'So you're saying that I'm better off dead.'

Lawliet's held his gaze, dark eyes as depthless and unblinking as the skulls'. 'You never did enjoy being alive.'

'Did you?' asked Light.

Lawliet looked away. 'I enjoyed solving mysteries.' His hands remained in his pockets. 'And eating sweets.'

'Do you wish you were still alive, then?' asked Light, watching him with relaxed eyes.

Lawliet glanced at him, then back at the skeletons, and a hand slipped from its pocket to rest its thumb at his lip. 'Yes.'

Light shifted his gaze away, eyes landing on the inhuman skull. 'You must hate me, then.'

Wild dark hair hid Lawliet's face. 'It was well-played. I admire that.'

'Then you must hate yourself,' said Light, bones crunching beneath his feet as he walked over to the skull, crouching down next to it.

'I suppose I do,' said Lawliet, watching Light through his bangs. 'But I'm sure Kira can relate.'

'No,' said Light, picking up the skull and turning it over in his hands, brushing his fingers over the branching antlers, the sharp teeth. 'I don't think I can.'

Lawliet bit slightly at his thumb. 'That was surprisingly honest of you.'

Light shrugged, setting the skull back down. 'You're the one who started it, L.'

'Kira didn't have to play along,' said Lawliet.

Light stood, hands slipping into his pockets. 'It's no fun, otherwise.'

Lawliet stared at him. 'Kira wouldn't know fun if it walked up to him and punched him in the face.'

Light's body was in profile, dark against the bones glowly dimly around him, halflight reflected on the swirling mists. 'Being Kira was fun.'

'My point stands,' said Lawliet.

Light's mouth quirked. 'As if you can talk, L.'

Lawliet looked at him sideways. 'I never claimed that I found solving mysteries fun. Only that I found them diverting and satisfying.'

'Semantics,' said Light.

'Excuses,' said Lawliet.

Light let out a quasi-breath, turning to meet his gaze. 'You're not going to let me win this one, are you?'

'No, I'm not,' said Lawliet.

'Fine,' said Light, and turned away, starting to walk in the other direction. 'You win.'

'Kira is truly a petulant child,' remarked Lawliet, watching him go.

Light kept walking. 'You can stay there if you want, L.'

Lips curving upwards, Lawliet followed.


	16. chapter xvi: remorse

**remorse**

They'd been walking for an eternity, but hadn't yet reached the end of the field of skeletons. It had become difficult to remember that there had ever been a beginning to it.

'How old were you when I killed you, anyway?' asked Light, eventually.

'Twenty-five,' said Lawliet.

Light let his lips twist, tilting his head to watch the ash that was perpetually descending, nestling in their hair, and which they'd long ago stopped bothering to brush it away. 'And you were beaten by someone who was only eighteen.'

'You were also beaten by someone who was only eighteen, you know,' said Lawliet, glancing at him through ash-frosted bangs.

'Yes,' agreed Light, 'but he was only five years younger than me, while I was seven years younger than you.'

'Two years is not that much of a difference,' said Lawliet.

'No, I suppose it isn't,' agreed Light, and gazed out over the skeletons that had long ago stopped being corpses that had once been bodies, now nothing more than bones that had always been merely bones. 'There isn't much difference between us now, is there.'

'Well, considering we are both dead,' said Lawliet, 'I'd say not.'

Light glanced at him. With all the gray-white ash in his hair, Lawliet's eyes and the shadows beneath them were the only darknesses that remained.

'At least it's obvious what my mistakes were,' said Light, turning his gaze once more to the nonexistent path ahead of them. 'Did you ever figure out what you did wrong?'

'I did nothing wrong,' said Lawliet, watching the ash descend, like feathers from a molting phoenix that would never again rise from its own remains. 'And at least I can say that.' Dark eyes flicked to Light's face. 'I never let my ego get the best of me.'

'If you could go back and redo it, there must be something you'd do differently,' said Light.

'That is a pointless hypothetical for two reasons,' said Lawliet. He held up a finger. 'One, we can't go back and redo anything. And two,' he held up another finger, 'if I could go back and redo everything with my current knowledge, I would just have you arrested immediately.'

'You would still need proof,' said Light.

'The fact that the killings would stop as soon as you were locked up would be proof enough,' said Lawliet, returning his hand to its pocket. 'And I'd already know you killed with the notebook, and would have your room searched after you were safely locked away.'

Light shook his head. 'You wouldn't have been able to retrieve it.'

'No, Kira would have done something clever with it, I'm sure,' agreed Lawliet, gaze following the ash as it drifted down, fluttering gently in the air they couldn't breathe. 'He probably would have hidden it in such a way that someone else's attempt to retrieve it would completely destroy it.'

'You give me too much credit,' said Light.

Lawliet glanced at him, eyes darker than ink. 'Nobody ever gave you enough credit, I think.'

There were a few moments of silence, and then Light chuckled softly. 'You make my life sound like a tragedy, L.'

'In a way,' said Lawliet, 'it is.' Inkwell eyes stayed marked on Light's face like they could brush darkness there with just their gaze. 'Nobody with a happy life would have become Kira, after all. And there was no way that anyone who became Kira would have led a happy life.'

Light nudged a ribcage with his foot, watched it crumble apart. 'I'm hardly the first tragedy you encountered. Detective work makes its business out of tragedies.'

Lawliet crouched down, carefully picking up one of the stray ribs between thumb and forefinger, holding it up to what meager illumination filtered through the heavy mists. 'I suppose that's true, to an extent.'

The surface of the bone bore no blemishes to suggest that it had been subject to the passage of time.

'Then I'm just the one that scared you the most,' said Light, eventually, and Lawliet carefully set the rib back down, hands resting on his knees.

'Do I still scare you?' asked Light, when Lawliet didn't answer.

'The dead do not scare me, Kira,' said Lawliet, eyes obscured by his hair, lips just barely moving. 'Nor, as one of the dead myself, do I now have anything to fear.'

'You said you were watching me,' said Light, looking down at him. 'Before I died, then, you weren't afraid of what I'd do to the world?'

'It was obvious that Kira was heading for a fall,' said Lawliet, 'and his reign would not last.'

'You must have felt flattered, then,' said Light, 'to think I tried so hard just for you.'

Lawliet's thumb moved to rest at his lips. 'When you look at it that way, it would make me partly responsible.'

'Do you believe yourself to be partly responsible?' asked Light.

Lawliet's chin lifted, hair tilting out of his face, his gaze drawn back to the ash still feathering downwards. 'I do believe that my actions may have spurred Kira on. That does not mean, however, that I believe I was wrong to act.'

Light's lips curved upwards. 'I'm glad you chose to act, L.'

'Yes,' said Lawliet, meeting his gaze, eyes dark and wide-open. 'Me, too.'


	17. chapter xvii: hubris

**hubris  
**

They were walking again, and their footsteps made no sound in the ash, their breaths no sound in the air.

'You said that you believe yourself to be partly responsible,' said Light, seemingly just to say something. 'Is that why you're here, then? In the same place I am?'

'I suppose that makes sense,' said Lawliet, slouching along with his hands in his pockets. 'It is curious, after all, that we have not encountered any other of the dead aside from these skeletons.' He carefully stepped over a spine, as if it were a snake. 'If we are truly dead and in the afterlife, it does not seem that there should be bones.'

' _The human who uses the notebook can neither go to Heaven nor Hell,_ ' recited Light. His lips quirked. 'I took that to mean that there was no Heaven or Hell, and Ryuk's reaction seemed to confirm the theory.'

The ash fell like dead rain into dead puddles, in which the dead bodies around them slowly and silently drowned.

'Do you believe in Purgatory, Kira?' asked Lawliet.

'No,' said Light.

Lawliet looked upwards, watching the ash settle in his bangs like dying moths. 'Me neither.'

'The only other world which we know has to exist is the Shinigami Realm,' noted Light, words too seamless.

'Even if this is the Shinigami Realm,' said Lawliet, tilting his head to glance at him, 'it would not explain how we ended up here.'

'It would explain the ash, though,' said Light, meeting his gaze. 'And the bones.'

Lawliet's gaze shifted back to the dead precipitation. 'If we did find a Shinigami, what would Kira do?'

'Try to trick them out of their Death Note, of course,' said Light, too fluidly. 'What else is there to do?'

Lawliet glanced at him again. 'That does not seem wise.'

'It does beg the question, though,' continued Light, 'of what we even are, if we're in the Shinigami world. Shinigami have lives, after all, and must kill humans in order to live. Is this a kind of life, then?' The skeletons glowed softly in the half-light. 'Do we also have to kill to keep on existing?'

'I do not think that a Shinigami is something one can become,' said Lawliet, a thumb at his lips, gaze intent on Light's face. 'And even if it were, it does not seem likely that we would simply become Shinigami after dying.'

'No, that's true,' agreed Light, crouching down to pick up a human skull with one hand. 'And Ryuk did tell me that I would not become a Shinigami after I died.'

Lawliet watched Light toss the skull up into the air, catch it; toss it again, catch it again. 'It would be just like Kira to assume something of that nature.'

'How do you explain this, though?' asked Light, gesturing with the skull to their surroundings. 'You said, after all, that you had a way of watching me. Shinigami, also, have ways of watching humans without leaving the Shinigami Realm.'

Lawliet's thumb brushed along his lip. 'Does Kira wish to be a Shinigami?'

'No,' said Light, immediately. 'The Shinigami are empty beings in an empty world, killing only to extend their own lives.' He watched Lawliet from the corner of his eye, lips curving upwards. 'I long ago surpassed them. I was even able to kill a Shinigami, after all.' His eyes were bright. 'Most Shinigami don't even know how to do that.'

'How _did_ Kira do that?' asked Lawliet, not looking away from him.

Light turned to him, skull still in his hands, smiling an unkind smile. 'You get a Shinigami to care about a human, and then you force their hand so that they must use their notebook to kill someone in order to save that human. Shinigami are not allowed to use their notebooks to extend the lives of humans who are meant to die.'

'So you had Rem kill me and Watari to prevent Misa from being convicted again,' said Lawliet, looking away. There was a skeletal hand, still miraculously attached to its arm, sticking up out of the ash. 'And you got rid of Rem in the process.' He glanced back up at Light's face. 'Rem had threatened you.'

'Rem was too attached to Misa,' said Light, turning away again, unkind smile still twisting his lips as he regarded the skull. 'I knew Rem would have to kill you, but I didn't know Rem would go so far as to kill Watari.' His eyes glinted, smile growing wider and no kinder. 'That was a pleasant surprise to me.'

Lawliet watched him with dark, hieroglyphic eyes. 'Kira is truly cruel.'

'You say that,' said Light, tilting his head to look at him, 'and yet you still pity me.'

The thumb moved away from Lawliet's lips, hand lowering to slip back into its pocket, shoulders hunching further. 'It's a shame nobody realized your potential.'

'Yes, L,' said Light, glancing at him with glinting eyes as he set the skull down, deliberate but irreverent. 'When searching for successors you and Wammy should have been looking at more than just orphans.' He straightened, his eyes narrowing slightly, lips curling, 'In fact, L, I think you have a more inflated opinion of yourself than you realize. Did you really think your position in the world was so important that you needed someone to replace you when you were gone?'

Lawliet glanced at him, before shifting his gaze upwards, watching the dehydrated precipitation. 'Would Kira have looked for a successor, if he'd lived long enough?'

'There's nobody who could have replaced me,' said Light.

The ash continued to descend softly, collecting like petals in Lawliet's hair. 'Then Kira's reign was always going to end with your death.'

The mists curled around them.

'Not if I lived forever,' said Light.

Lawliet glanced at him again, head tilted. 'You could not have truly believed that you would, Kira.'

Light met his gaze and smiled. 'And yet I'm still here, aren't I?'


	18. chapter xviii: uncertainty

**uncertainty**

There was a large, jagged rock jutting out of the ground.

Light picked up a skull, tossed it once into the air, and then threw it at the rock as hard as he could.

Shards of bone flew in every direction.

Lawliet dropped down into a crouch, watching the ivory slivers pass over his head. 'What was that for, Kira?'

'We're not actually dead,' said Light, quietly, pulling a splinter of bone out of his cheek and glancing at it dismissively. 'Are we?'

'We're not alive,' said Lawliet, watching Light drop the bloodless shard to the ground.

Light touched a hand to his cheek, checking for a wound that wasn't there. 'But we still exist.'

'Our bodies are rotting in the ground,' pointed out Lawliet.

'But not our minds,' said Light. He gestured between them. 'Not whatever these are.'

Hands shifting from his knees, Lawliet stood. 'We're not lost, Kira.' He slipped his hands into his pockets. 'There's no path that leads back.'

Light tilted his head. 'Who said anything about needing a path?'

Lawliet looked at him, eyes dark. 'There's nobody to bargain with.'

Light's bangs hid his eyes. 'There are Shinigami, aren't there?'

'Shinigami take lives,' said Lawliet. 'They don't return them.'

'No,' said Light, turning to meet his gaze, bangs brushing aside and eyes glinting. 'They steal life and redistribute it.' Light clasped his hands behind his head, turning his gaze upwards. 'They would be concerned, then, if too many human lives were being taken by other humans, would they not? They need a steady supply to keep on existing, after all. It would be concerning if anything were to threaten that.'

A hand slipped from its pocket, thumb resting against Lawliet's lip. 'That would require an awful lot of killing.' His eyes were black and unblinking.

'It would,' agreed Light, blandly, watching the ash fall.

'I cannot allow Kira to steal a Death Note and continue killing people,' said Lawliet.

Light closed his eyes and let out a breathless sigh, dropping his arms to his sides. 'It really is boring here, isn't it?' He turned away, hands sliding into his pockets, eyes slipping open and staring at nothing. 'I wonder how the Shinigami stand it.'

Lawliet watched him, biting at his thumb.


	19. chapter xix: love

**love**

Light had climbed to the top of the jagged rock, and L had followed him, the two of them standing there and staring out over the desolate landscape spread out below them.

'Do you want to know another reason why you failed, Kira?' asked Lawliet.

As far as they could see in the gloom, in every direction, there was nothing but mist and ash and bones.

'By all means, L,' said Light.

The ash continued to fall, the mists continuing to curl, but other than that there was neither movement nor sound; it was as if the world were not just dead, but ossified.

'You never understood love,' said Lawliet. 'With Misa, and with Mikami, you could not predict their actions, and therefore you could not control them, because you believed that their love for you meant that they would do whatever you said.'

Light turned his gaze from the stagnate landscape submerged in gloom.

Lawliet's face was tilted upwards, eyes dark, shadows pooled beneath them. 'You did not realize that their love would cause them to act on their own and do what they believed best to help you.'

'The best way to help me would have been to do what I said,' said Light.

'They loved you, Kira,' said Lawliet, softly. He tilted his head just enough to meet Light's gaze. 'You do whatever you can to protect those you love.'

Light's exhale failed to stir the hair obscuring his face. 'Well, I suppose I can't claim to have ever loved.' He turned, then, hands in his pockets, disregarding the edge of the rock a half-step behind him. 'Did you, L?'

'Did I ever love?' inquired Lawliet. He turned his gaze upwards, a thumb coming up to press against his lips. 'I loved cake.'

Light tossed the hair out of his eyes with a slight shake of his head. 'A person, L.'

'No,' said Lawliet, 'I suppose I cannot claim to have ever loved, either.' He glanced at Light with a pitch-black gaze. 'But that does not mean I could not comprehend it in the way that you couldn't.'

Light fixed him with a languid stare. 'Did you ever want to be loved, then?'

'No,' said Lawliet. 'I never did.'

'I figured,' said Light. 'I don't think you have any right to lecture me on love, L.' He looked away, hair slanting across his face. 'And, anyway, I don't particularly care.'

'I didn't think you would,' said Lawliet, gaze on the skeletons scattered in the ash below them, thumb brushing over lips. 'Your disregard for love is why you failed, after all.'

'Maybe you're right, L,' said Light, tone indolent.

Lawliet looked at him evenly. 'I'm never wrong.'

Light took a small step back and tilted his head up to watch the falling ash, a breathless sigh escaping past his lips. 'How boring.'


	20. chapter xx: incitement

**incitement**

A hand enclosed around Light's wrist, tugging him slightly.

He blinked, meeting Lawliet's dark gaze curiously. 'What is it, L?'

'Careful,' said Lawliet, the whites of his eyes visible all the way around his dark irises. 'You'll fall.'

Light craned his neck slightly, glancing at the edge of the rock just behind him, the ground far below. 'I wonder if it would hurt.'

'Probably not,' said Lawliet, tightening his grip around Light's wrist. 'Still, I don't particularly want to find out whether or not we can break.'

Light looked at him with glinting eyes, lips curling. 'You're not curious, L?'

'Some things are better left unknown,' said Lawliet.

Light's grin showed teeth. 'But those are the things that won't leave us alone, aren't they?' He took a step back, forcing Lawliet to take a step forward. 'Are you sure you want to chain yourself to me again?'

They held each other's gaze, unblinking, depthless black and lightless umber.

Light took another step back, leaning slightly over the edge so that Lawliet had to brace himself to keep them both from falling. 'Well?'

'No,' said Lawliet finally, and let go of his wrist.

Light closed his eyes and fell.


	21. chapter xxi: collusion

**collusion**

When Light opened his eyes, Lawliet was standing over him, biting at his thumb.

'Well,' sighed Light, sitting up and brushing the ash from his hair, 'that was decidedly disappointing.'

'What did Kira expect?' asked Lawliet, moving back as Light stood up. 'You didn't actually expect to break anything, did you?'

'I thought at least the freefall might be exciting,' said Light, brushing the ash from his clothes.

'I warned you not to do it,' pointed out Lawliet.

'You said that because you knew I'd take it as a challenge and go through with it,' pointed out Light, stretching his arms over his head, as if he could actually still crack his back.

'True,' said Lawliet, thumb against his lips. 'But I still get to tell you that I told you so.'

Light lowered his arms, turning to look at Lawliet out of the corner of his eye, lips quirking. 'Who's acting childish now, L?'

'That would be me,' said Lawliet, looking out from behind his hair, thumb brushing over his lip. 'But I'm not the one who jumped off a ledge because I was bored.'

'No,' agreed Light, 'you're the one who pushed me.'

Lawliet's eyes were round and dark, his words mumbled around his thumb. 'I didn't push you.'

Light looked at him levelly, eyes achromatic in the gloom. 'And I didn't jump.'


	22. chapter xxii: depravity

**depravity**

The world around them seemed to have gotten darker, and the mists coiled over the skeletons in such a way that the bones almost seemed to stir, but there were no sounds to accompany any perceived movement, the landscaped drenched in silence.

'What did you do to Naomi Misora, Kira?' asked Lawliet.

'Hm?' said Light, tilting his head just enough to glance at him out of the corner of his eye.

Lawliet was watching him with Stygian eyes. 'Raye Penber's fiancée.'

'Oh, her,' said Light, and smiled slightly. 'I tricked her into telling me her real name by pretending I was a member of the Task Force, and had her commit suicide in a way that didn't inconvenience anyone and such that her body would not be found.'

'She would not have trusted you so easily at that,' said Lawliet.

Light turned his gaze upwards, lightless eyes reflecting the absence of moon and stars above them. 'She said that I reminded her of you, L.' He glanced at Lawliet again, and his eyes were gray and limpid. 'She felt that we were similar, and that was why she felt she could trust me.'

It was Lawliet who looked away, hair obscuring his eyes, thumb raising to his lips and lingering there. 'We're that similar, huh?'

'You must have noticed how it unnerved the rest of the Task Force,' said Light, turning more fully toward him. 'You've even noted it yourself.'

'Yes,' agreed Lawliet, the lower half of his face all that was visible, thumb brushing over his lip. He seemed to shrink in on himself, slightly. 'But that's different from hearing that it was because Naomi Misori trusted me that you were able to kill her.'

Light's lips curled. 'Don't act so surprised, L. I used our similarities to kill a lot of people.' His eyes were glinting, even in the darkness. 'I pretended to be you for five years, after all.'

'Yes,' agreed Lawliet, softly, face still obscured and shoulders still hunched as if bearing some great weight.

'Still don't hate me?' asked Light, and laughed, wry.

Lawliet's thumb slowly lowered from his lips, and his voice was subdued. 'If I hated Kira, I'd also have to hate myself.'

'And don't you?' asked Light.

Lawliet met his gaze, then, and held it. His eyes were dark, wide, unflinching. 'No, I don't.'

Light's lips pulled apart, splitting further as he lowered his chin, hair falling over glinting eyes but doing nothing to hide the glint of teeth. 'Finally, L, your true feelings come to light.'

'That was a terrible pun,' said Lawliet, both hands resting casually in his pockets and posture returned more to languid than burdened.

'And that was a terrible attempt at derailing the conversation,' said Light, looking up through his hair with a triumphant curl of his lips. 'It must be difficult to admit that you're as unscrupulous as I am. That our similarities don't stop at your potential to have traveled a similar path.' He grinned, then, and his eyes were alight. 'Though I must admit you had an even more cunning way of hiding it.'

Light's expression became slier, his voice more insinuating. 'Perhaps it wasn't you who ended up in the same place as me, then, L, but I who ended up in the same place as you.'

'Well,' said Lawliet, and looked upwards at the where the moon would likely have been, had they still been alive, 'I did get here first.'


	23. chapter xxiii: isolation

**isolation**

The mists had thinned, the air lightening slightly, and they had climbed to the top of another rocky outcropping only to find that the only thing the increased visibility revealed aside from more desolation was the umber coloring of Light's hair and eyes.

'Still nothing here,' Light murmured, vaguely. Sighing, he sat down, one leg dangling over the edge of the rock, the other bent up next to him, an arm resting along the top of his knee.

Lawliet crouched next to him, hands gripping the fabric of his pants around his ankles, and when he spoke his voice was low. 'Was Kira every lonely?'

They both stared into the empty distance, watching the rocks and skeletons lie still.

'In the cell, maybe,' said Light, finally. His tone was languid, like the ash, which was falling more like autumn leaves than like rain. 'Were you?'

'Yes,' said Lawliet, smoothly, and glanced at Light out of the corner of his eyes. 'Though I did not realize it was loneliness I felt until I realized that I was not actually alone.'

'Is that part of why you wanted me on the Kira case, aside from the fact that I was the prime suspect?' asked Light, and the bones he was watching did not move.

Lawliet's gaze slipped away, his fingers tensing around his ankles slightly, briefly, before relaxing again. 'Your reasoning abilities are truly amazing.'

Light tilted his head, giving Lawliet the same offhanded look that the bones had been subject to a moment earlier. 'Would you have wanted me on the Kira case if I hadn't been a suspect?'

Dark eyes met his, just as phlegmatically. 'If circumstances had led me to bear witness to your reasoning ability, then yes, I would have wanted you on the case.'

Light smiled slightly, emptily, looked away and let his hair fall into his face. 'Do you think you could ever have trusted me?'

'Yes,' said Lawliet.

Light blinked, meeting Lawliet's gaze again. 'I didn't think you'd actually answer that question.'

'Do you think you could have afforded me the same?' asked Lawliet, watching him intently.

Light offered the empty smile again. 'If you hadn't been L, and I hadn't been Kira.'

'Yes, I agree,' said Lawliet, and looked away, hair casting sharp shadows over his eyes. 'In another life, we could have not been enemies.'

Light turned his gaze back to the bones, which had not moved. 'It's a pointless conjecture.'

Lawliet glanced at him. 'It could be considered a comforting one, though.'

'It could also be argued that neither of us deserve any comfort,' said Light, tone insouciant, gaze hidden.

'People rarely get what they deserve, Kira,' said Lawliet, voice low, dark eyes gazing out from under his bangs.

Light just let out an affected sigh and tilted his head back so that the hair fell out of his empty eyes. 'There is truly no justice to be had, then.'


	24. chapter xxiv: guile

**guile**

The endless field of bones was thinning out, individual skeletons becoming separate and distinguishable, no longer heaps of pieces from unsolved, mixed-up, unsolvable puzzles.

Lawliet was crouched down next to one that looked like it had been kicked at some point, bones scattered slightly, and he was carefully putting it back together. It was starting to resemble some kind of small cat.

'Did you ever have pets, Kira?' asked Lawliet, holding up a couple vertebrae to better examine them.

Light was leaning against a rock and watching him idly, arms crossed over his chest. 'I had a little sister.'

Lawliet glanced at him, before setting the vertebrae down in the ash, lining them up in order. 'That's different.'

'Sorry,' said Light. 'That was an inside joke. I used to tease her.'

Lawliet picked up another vertebra. 'Did you have a good relationship with your sister?' He set the vertebra in the ash, in line with the others.

'I suppose so,' said Light. 'We didn't fight, which is apparently unusual between siblings.'

Lawliet paused in the process of placing another vertebra, glancing at him. 'Kira didn't need to fight to get things his way.'

'Fighting is counter-productive,' said Light. He tossed the hair out of his eyes. 'What about you, L? I can't imagine you were allowed pets at the orphanage.'

'No,' said Lawliet, nudging the vertebrae together into a natural curve from skull to tail. 'But there was a cat at the orphanage, for a while. I used to sneak her food, and she would destroy my shoes.' The skeleton looked slightly off, and he nudged a gap into the spine where there seemed to be a vertebra missing, before his hand retreated back to rest on a knee. 'After the fourth pair, I was finally allowed to stay barefoot.'

'Manipulating a cat into destroying your shoes, L?' said Light, and the corner of his lips quirked. 'With the food, no doubt. That's rather juvenile.'

Lawliet gazed over the ash, looking for the missing vertebra. 'I was quite young at the time.'

'You always did play dirty,' said Light, and pushed off from the wall.

Lawliet's dark eyes settled on him. 'That is an unfair conclusion to come to from such limited information.'

Crouching down, Light picked up the vertebra that had been cast astray, standing back up as he brushed off the ash and turned the bone over in his hands. 'But it's not inaccurate, is it?'

Lawliet watched Light toss the vertebra into the air and then catch it. 'No.'

Light walked over and dropped the vertebra in front of Lawliet, creating a small crater in the ash. 'Yeah.' He tucked his hands into his pockets. 'That's what I thought.'

Lawliet looked at him for a moment, and then silently took the vertebra and completed the cat's spine.


	25. chapter xxv: denial

**denial**

Light was lying on top of the rock, arms behind his head, eyes open and ash dusting his eyelashes.

'Why did you punch me?'

Light turned his head slightly to glance over at Lawliet.

The cat skeleton lay in the ash, complete except for a few missing toes, and Lawliet was crouched there staring at it, hands on his knees.

'I don't think the dead cat is going to answer that question, L,' said Light.

Lawliet sent him a sideways look. 'When you didn't have your memories of being Kira.'

'Oh,' said Light, and straightened his head to stare back up at the heavy wisps of mist curling above them. 'Yes, that was strange. I don't think I'd ever punched someone before.'

'I could tell,' said Lawliet.

'Heh.' Light sat up, turning so that his legs dangled over the edge of the rock, head tilted down so his bangs obscured his face. 'When you give up ownership of your Death Note, you lose all memories of it.' His fingers tapped slowly on the stone beside him. 'If I'd been able to look at the evidence with a clear mind, I believe I would have concluded that I was Kira. However, I suppose that isn't allowed, and thus giving up ownership made it so not only could I not remember being Kira, but I could not even consider the thought of being Kira.'

He glanced up, then, meeting Lawliet's gaze. 'And, because I could not consider the possibility, I lashed out in a way that I would not have under any other circumstances.'

A thumb moved to Lawliet's lips. 'You seemed to come to a point where you believed you were Kira while you were locked in solitary confinement, though.'

Light blinked, finally, and particles of ash fluttered from his eyelashes. 'I suppose the Death Note's power could not hold completely on a mind thats sanity was crumbling.' He glanced at one of his wrists, the cuffs of his shirt unbuttoned to reveal scarred skin.

He curled his fingers for a moment, and then relaxed them, lowering his hand back to the slab of rock, which did not feel cold; he was just as devoid of heat and heartbeat as the stone was. 'And it appears that its power does not hold at all on the dead.'

Lawliet's dark eyes were round, and he smiled against his thumb. 'It looks like there is some amount of justice, after all.'


	26. chapter xxvi: destruction

**destruction**

The cat skeleton was completely assembled, and Lawliet was still crouching there, staring at it.

Eventually Light stood up and walked over, staring down at the unmoving Lawliet for a while, before he kicked the cat skeleton, scattering the pieces in the ash.

Lawliet looked up at him with dark, reproachful eyes. 'What was that for, Kira?'

'You looked so distraught that it was completed,' said Light. 'I thought I'd help you out.' He pulled handfuls of bones from his pockets and dropped them among the scattered bones of the cat, mixing in pieces from other puzzles and confounding the picture. 'Wouldn't want you to get bored, after all.' He gave pile another kick for good measure, hands in his empty pockets.

Lawliet reached out and began carefully organizing the pieces of skeleton into piles by bone type. 'What does Kira plan on doing, then?' He paused with a scapula held carefully between two fingers, glancing up through his dark bangs. 'Still planning on taking over this world?'

Light looked at him expressionlessly. 'There's no point in becoming the God of a dead world, L.'

Lawliet turned his attention back to organizing the bones, setting aside all those that did not fit, or which had cracked when Light had kicked them. 'For someone so brilliant, it sure took you a long time to figure that out.'

Light shifted his gaze away and looked out into the empty distance, still and silent.


	27. chapter xxvii: renascence

**renascence**

Light was lying on the rock and gazing upwards into the cimmerian mists, one arm dangling limply over the edge. The falling ash was collecting even on the surfaces of his open, unblinking eyes, settling over his unmoving form like funeral flowers covering a coffin.

'What is wrong, Kira-kun?' asked Lawliet finally, standing from the completed cat skeleton—the same as before Light had destroyed it, but with a few extra toes—and shuffling over, hands in his pockets.

Light didn't turn to look at him, continuing to stare upwards with blank, ash-covered eyes. 'I feel like I should be going insane.' His voice was barely a murmur. He lifted a hand upwards, closing fingers around empty air. 'But it's not there. There's just nothing.' The arm lowered back to his side. 'I don't feel insane.' His fingers twitched, as if he were attempting to move his arm again, but then stilled. 'I don't feel anything.'

'Well, you are dead, after all,' pointed out Lawliet.

'I don't need you to tell me that, L,' murmured Light, without bitterness, but without anything else, either.

Lawliet looked down at him, dark shadows beneath darker eyes. 'You did ask me to remind you, if you recall.'

'Can you feel anything, L?' asked Light, distantly. 'Is it death, or is it just me?'

Lawliet glanced upwards, but the ash drifted down and tried to settle over his cornea, so he lowered his gaze back to Light's lifeless form, bangs shielding his dark eyes and casting his face in shadow. 'I can feel some things.'

He bit at his thumb. 'Or they might just be memories of what it felt like to feel those things. It's difficult to tell.'

'I'm bored,' murmured Light, like someone might have murmured that the world was over. 'But I can't hurt myself, and I can't fall apart.'

'You would prefer falling apart?' asked Lawliet, quietly.

'Yes,' said Light. 'In the cell, after the insanity set in, I stopped feeling the boredom so keenly.' He finally blinked away the ash on his eyes, and a trembling hand came up to cover his face. 'I feel like I should be falling apart, but am being forcibly held together.' His voices was slightly muffled by his palm, and his eyes were closed behind his fingers. 'Do you not have that feeling, L?'

Lawliet was silent for a while, watching the ash settle over Light's form as if to bury him, slowly erase him from existence.

'I think I feel something similar,' admitted Lawliet, finally, and looked away, fingers tensing for a moment in the fabric of his pants before relaxing again. 'Like there are things that should be there that are inexplicably absent. Like I'm constantly about to sneeze, but never do, and know I never will.'

'A rather inelegant analogy for it,' murmured Light, hand slipping from his face and eyes opening to gaze once more into the gloom, 'but accurate enough.'

Lawliet glanced at him. 'What does Kira-kun plan to do about it?'

Light shifted his gaze in Lawliet's direction, but seemed to lack the energy to even narrow his eyes. 'What's with the Kira-kun all of a sudden?'

'Do I need a reason?' murmured Lawliet, thumb at his lips. 'You're avoiding the question.'

'So are you,' said Light. He looked away again. 'And I've already told you all my ideas, L. You weren't very enthusiastic about any of them.'

'They weren't very good ideas,' said Lawliet.

'Do you have any better ones?' asked Light, not looking at him.

Lawliet was looking down, biting at his thumb, bare toes curling in the ash. 'We could play a game.'

'And what kind of game would you suggest?' said Light dully.

Lawliet glanced up at him through his bangs, eyes dark and lucid. 'Two Lies and a Truth?'

Light's ribs collapsed in a quasi-sigh. 'What confession are you trying to get out of me, L?'

'Maybe I just want to learn more about Kira-kun,' said Lawliet, lowering his hand, a slight imprint of teeth in his thumb.

'Enough that you're actually willing to part with information about yourself?' asked Light, glancing at him from the corner of a dull, half-lidded eye.

'Well,' said Lawliet, stepping onto the rock beside Light and crouching there, hands resting on his knees, gazing out into the mist-heavy shadows that surrounded him, 'there's no danger in giving you information about me when we're already dead, now is there?'

'No,' agreed Light, finally sitting up, shifting so his legs hung over the edge, head tilted down so his hair obscured his face. 'But you strike me as the kind of person who prefers to remain a mystery. You don't want anybody to know you. That's not going to change just because you're dead.'

Lawliet looked at him sideways. 'Kira-kun isn't just anybody.'

'Heh.' Light's bangs hid his eyes, but not the wry quirk of his lips. 'I'm not actually as sentimental as I acted, you know. And I know that you aren't, either.'

'I know,' said Lawliet. 'But there's nothing else to do here. Would you rather just keep lying there wishing you could go insane?'

Light's fingers curled over the rock's edge, knuckles whitening, shoulders starting to tremble. 'If I could just find a Shinigami…'

'Kira-kun,' said Lawliet.

Light's fingers relaxed, his shoulders stilling. 'L.'

'I really do consider you to be the closest thing I've ever had to a friend,' said Lawliet, quietly. 'I told you that in another life we could have not been enemies.' The halflight filtering through the mists caught on his dark eyes, but could do nothing about the shadows beneath them. 'And, like you pointed out, this could really just be considered another life.'

'I don't know how to not think of you as an enemy, L,' said Light.

Lawliet watched the ash fall, fluttering down around them like achromatic sakura petals, curling and spinning on some breeze that stirred the darkness around them but caused them no sensation.

'Why don't you start by calling me Lawliet, Light-kun.'


	28. chapter xxviii: flashover

**flashover**

Light's ribs hitched, eyes widening, and he froze.

Lawliet waited.

Slowly, carefully, Light turned his head to stare at him, eyes narrowing.

'You're serious.' The words fell from Light's tongue like ash.

'Yes,' said Lawliet, holding his gaze with sleepless eyes.

Light laughed, then, and looked away, grinning wryly into the omnipresent gloom; the shadows almost seemed to shrink away from him. 'I don't know what to do with that information.'

'Is it really so difficult to imagine that I might not have ulterior motives?' asked Lawliet, softly.

Light looked at him, expression dispassionate. 'Yes.'

Lawliet's gaze lowered. 'I'm tired, Light-kun.' His voice was quiet, and he seemed to curl tighter in on himself, hands sliding down his shins to curl around his ankles, clenching. 'I'm tired of feeling alone.'

Light stared at him.

For a while both of them were silent, and neither of them moved.

'I said that if it was friendship you wanted, I'd gladly give it to you,' murmured Light, finally, and his ribs contracted again. 'Very well, then.' He stood, turning to face Lawliet and offering his hand.

Lawliet looked at Light's hand, then up at his face.

Light wasn't smiling, but it would have been a lie if he had.

'My name is Light Yagami,' he said, 'and before I came to be known as Kira I was a childhood prodigy and teenage genius who didn't care about anything.'

Lawliet stood from his crouch and stepped off the rock. 'L Lawliet,' he said, shaking the offered hand. 'And when I wasn't solving cases I, too, didn't care about anything.'

Their handshake broke, and both of them tucked their hands back into their pockets.

'It's nice to finally officially meet you, Light,' Lawliet said, offering a childish smile, eyes black and fathomless.

A hint of an amused smile ghosted briefly over Light's lips. His eyes, while not quite alive, weren't quite dead, either.

'The pleasure is all mine, Lawliet.'

* * *

 **end.**

* * *

 **an:** _flashover_ : _(n.) "_ the moment a conversation becomes real and alive, which occurs when a spark of trust shorts out the delicate circuits you keep insulated under layers of irony, momentarily grounding the static emotional charge you've built up through decades of friction with the world" (Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows).


	29. sneak peek: rot

**an:** ...Did that ending surprise anyone else? Because it surprised _me_ , and I'm the one who wrote it, lol. But I honestly had no idea how this story was going to end, and then I wrote that chapter, and I just stood there staring at the screen for a while, feeling really, really strange, because the story had up and ended on me. With absolutely no warning. There was just... nowhere to go, from there, and I got the feeling that the entire story had been leading up to that one moment, and I just didn't know it till it happened.

It was especially weird, because I'd been planning for them to run into some Shinigami at some point, and had plans concerning that, so I was kinda disappointed they didn't. But at the same time, I actually really like the ending, and felt that I couldn't have them meet Shinigami after that, since I want those events to take place before they've kind of started to bridge the gap between them at all.

So I was just like, You know what? Why do I have to choose one? I'll just do both! #obviousdecisionisobvious

So I'm actually writing a spin-off to this story where they actually do encounter some Shinigami, and get up to trouble. The spin-off branches off from this one after _chapter xviii: uncertainty,_ and then goes in a different direction from there.

I hope, if you enjoyed this story, that you will join me over on the spin-off, as well :3 It's entitled _rot,_ and I've started posting it, so you can find it on my profile if you're interested. (I have a lot of plans for that story, bwahaha.)

In the meantime, however, here's an (evilly small) abridged teaser trailer, so to speak (did I mention that it's abridged? it's really just to give you the basic idea of what to expect, circumstances-wise):

* * *

 **sneak peek: _rot_  
**

* * *

'You found something that makes you certain that Shinigami do exist here,' realized Lawliet.

Light reached one hand into his pocket, taking out something gray and misshapen, tossing it to Lawliet. 'Explain that to me, L.'

Lawliet carefully held the object before his face, examining the tooth marks. '...Shinigami love apples, huh.'

Light's smile was disquieting. 'What do you say we go trick them out of their Death Notes?'

Lawliet looked over at him. 'I can't let you do that, Kira.'

Light's smiled widened, eyes gleaming. 'Just try to stop me, L.'


End file.
